Josephine Cox Sunday Times Bestsellers Collection. Josephine Cox
that I was expecting. I wanted so much to let you know about him, but I couldn’t, because I didn’t know where you were.’ Her voice faltered. ‘I called him James – Jamie – after your middle name. Jamie Baker, he is – but now we can change it to Trent.’
Only a few minutes ago, her heart had been singing, but now she could see what a shock it was to him, and she was fearful.
‘It’ll be all right,’ she gabbled. ‘We’ll get married and rent a little house and I’ll work at Haskell Hall like now, and oh, Edward, it will be so wonderful …’
She paused, hope smiling in her eyes. ‘It will be wonderful, won’t it?’
The man didn’t answer straight away. His mind was feverishly working. A child? A bastard to keep his feet tied to the ground while he broke his back working to keep him, and her. He didn’t want that. Besides, how could he be sure it was his? He only had her word for it. For all he knew, he could be taking on another man’s throwaway.
‘Edward?’ her small voice persisted. ‘It will be all right, won’t it?’ Lucy had always realised that if he ever came back, the news would be a shock, but she had hoped that, in the end, he would be overjoyed to have a son.
‘Of course, and why wouldn’t it be?’ His quick smile belied the rage inside. If she thought he was staying now, she’d soon find out different.
‘And you’re not angry?’
‘Angry?’ He held her close as though he would never let her go. ‘How could I be angry? I won’t deny it was a shock, but what man wouldn’t be pleased to know he had a son waiting for him?’
Lucy was thrilled. ‘We’ll be a proper family, and I’ll make you happy, I promise.’ Even though there was still that little voice warning her to be wary, Lucy had to believe him.
‘Where is he, this son of mine?’
‘Back at Bridget’s house. Oh Edward, she’s been so good to us. Some people say she’s the worst of the worst because she has girls who entertain, but she’s a good woman. You’ll see when you meet her. She has a helper by the name of Tillie who takes care of our son when I’m working …’
‘I see.’ He stopped her there. ‘And you say she has girls who entertain?’ He thought of Lynette, and smirked.
Lucy nodded earnestly. ‘They’re my friends. Bridget looks after them … like she looks after me.’
‘Took them off the street, did she?’
‘Something like that, yes.’ Lucy didn’t care for the way the conversation was going. ‘But they’re good girls … I mean, they’re kind and thoughtful, and they’ve helped me through a bad time. When my parents found out about the baby, they went crazy. My mam wanted to send me to a woman in the back streets who does away with unwanted pregnancies, and my dad said she was callous, and that we should wait until you came back and he’d make sure it got sorted out.’
The memories had never gone away, though thanks to Bridget she had managed to push a lot of it to the back of her mind. Now though, it all came flooding back; the rows and upsets, and the terrible things that were said. Lucy had always thought her parents were happily married, when all the time they had just been ‘rubbing along’, as her mother had put it.
When she told them she was pregnant, it was as though she had lifted a lid they had each been struggling to keep shut, and all the venom came to the surface. ‘Oh Edward, it was awful. In the end, they split up, and I found myself out on the streets. That was when Bridget took me in. She was at convent school with my mam, but she’s as different from her as chalk from cheese.’ Tears filled her eyes. ‘Mam didn’t want anything to do with me, or her grandchild, but Bridget’s been both mother to me and granny to the bairn.’
Edward curled his lip at this description of a ‘tart with a golden heart’. ‘Well, you’ve no need to worry now,’ he lied. ‘I’m here and like your father said, it will all be sorted out.’
In reality he was already wondering where he’d dropped his kitbag, so he could go back and collect it and be gone like the wind out of here. If he’d had any feelings for her at all, they’d been suffocated by the news she’d given him. A bastard waiting to claim him for life, women who ‘entertained’ – and how could he be sure that Lucy herself had not ‘entertained’ some man or another, and that’s how she came to be with child? Oh no! He might be a fool for a good-looking woman, but he was not fool enough to truss himself up like a chicken ready for the oven.
‘Edward?’ Lucy could see he was deep in thought. ‘What’s wrong?’ She knew he was thinking of the news she had just given him.
‘Oh, I’m sorry, sweetheart.’ Scrambling to his feet, he took hold of her hand and pulled her up to him. ‘I’ll get my kitbag, then we’ll walk back and you can introduce me to my son. Then we’ll make plans. It’s all going to be fine, Lucy.’
They got up and walked on, and she nestled in the curve of his arm, a spring in her step and a song in her heart. Edward was back. Everything would be fine now.
As they walked, Lucy was full of plans. ‘We’ll find a little house to rent with a good-sized garden, and we’ll sit outside and watch our son playing, then of an evening, we can see the sun going down. Oh, sweetheart …’ She looked at him and her heart was full. ‘I’m so glad you’re back.’
The man cared nothing for her dreaming. He had plans of his own, and they certainly didn’t include sitting around in a garden and watching somebody else’s kid playing. But he didn’t want Lucy to know what he was thinking, so he said all the right things and convinced her that if that was what she wanted, then so did he. And Lucy believed him.
‘Look!’ Drawing his attention to the flock of sheep being driven to the brow of the hill, Lucy told him, ‘There’s Barney Davidson.’
As he turned to see, Lucy gave him a playful push and ran on. ‘Race you to the lane!’
‘You little sod!’ She had caught him off-guard, and he was thrilled. This was what spurred him on, a spirited woman fleeing and himself in full chase: and when he caught her, what fun it would be. ‘Come on, Eddie boy,’ he said to himself. ‘Get after her. Leave her with another mouth to feed and happen she’ll find some other poor bugger to take her on!’
For a moment he stood his ground and watched her running, bare-footed, with the pretty shoes dangling from her hand and her hair flowing behind, and the sound of her laughter exciting him – and he had a moment of weakness. For one dangerous, fleeting moment, he actually thought she might be worth staying for. But when fear took over, the moment was quickly gone.
Wickedness surged through him, and a sense of fun. There was no need to commit himself, not when he could have it all and walk away. Right now, Lucy wanted him to chase her and he would, and that was all right, because this was what he believed life was all about. Never mind responsibility. That was for other folks, not for a free-and-easy-living man like himself.
With a shout to let her know he was right behind, he set off at the run.
High on the hill, Barney saw the two of them careering across the field towards the stile; Lucy in front and going like the wind, and the man fast closing in.
He could hear the young woman’s merry laughter and he smiled. ‘Seems like she’s found a bit of happiness,’ he told Jess, his red-setter bitch, who trotted beside him, keeping an eye on the sheep. ‘Lord knows, she deserves it after what she’s been through.’
He knew Lucy because the two of them often chatted as she wended her way to work, and last winter, he had taken her along the lane in his cart because the hills were snow-covered. That was the very first time she had confided in him. After that, they had often walked the hills in the same direction, her going to and from the squire’s house and himself to the outlying fields where he would check his flock.
As they got to know each other better, Lucy had